Pervert exposed himself to girls

PERVERT . . . Mohammed Tahir

A WELL-RESPECTED former football coach who impressed Tony Blair with his fund-raising work has been jailed for 10 months after exposing himself to young girls at a swimming baths.

Mohammed Tahir, a married father-of-two, was living at Adventurers Quay in Cardiff Bay when he climbed into a shower with a 15-year-old girl at the city’s international sports complex in January, this year.

Three days later, he was back there. This time he exposed himself and committed a sex act in front of shocked young teenagers, Cardiff Crown Court heard.

A liaison officer for the Oldham Sunday League and involved with coaching at Oldham Athletic, Tahir was once invited to meet Tony Blair to celebrate his fund-raising work. He was also nominated for a Pride in Oldham Award.

Tahir, who had been due to start work in May as a customer services representative with Conduit UK, was said to have put that job on hold while he pleaded guilty to charges of indecent exposure and outraging public decency. The court was told that Tahir already had a conviction for indecently assaulting a female as long ago as 1988 and for gross indecency in Manchester eight years ago.

He appeared before magistrates in Bury in April, 2004, for what was said to be a strikingly similar offence to the one in Cardiff.

On that occasion, Tahir wedged open the doors of a ladies’ changing room and opened his towel when two 13-year-old girls appeared. Tahir also has a string of convictions for fraud and theft.

David Leathley, defending, accepted Tahir — whose wife is standing by him — was a sexual deviant who displayed an addictive pattern of exposure to females.

He added: “I have referred to him to his face as a pervert and he knows how society feels.”

Jailing Tahir for 10 months and putting him on the sex offenders’ register, the Recorder of Cardiff, Nicholas Cooke QC, said he had been assessed as being a potential high risk to females.

In a Sexual Offenders’ Prevention Order, Tahir was also banned from going to any play area or changing rooms at any leisure facility.